


Missing Persons Report

by felsider (VSSAKJ)



Series: Eternal War: Birthrights [1]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Gen, POV Second Person, everyone has powers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-07
Updated: 2018-12-07
Packaged: 2019-09-13 11:48:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,440
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16892028
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/VSSAKJ/pseuds/felsider
Summary: “My son.” She murmurs, rocking the babe. “My boy Yasu is gone.”





	Missing Persons Report

**The Mother**  
She enters your station with a baby at her breast, a tiny thing no more than two weeks old. At her side is a son, fitted with a sombre expression while he carries a second infant, occupying her grasping fingers with a knobbly, floating block. The twins must be at home, you think, with the other sons and their father. It isn’t your intention to know everyone’s business, but being a man of the law extends you certain privileges, no matter how unwelcome.

“Lan.” You speak warmly, smiling for her. She just looks tired. “What can I do for you?”

“My son.” She murmurs, rocking the babe. “My boy Yasu is gone.”

Your smile falters; you know the child in question. He’s the eldest of her seven children, white-haired and hard-working and ever quick to smile. You can’t imagine him being away from his siblings for more than a few hours at most, but perhaps you don’t know him so well as you presume. “Lan… are you sure? Who would have seen him last? When did you last see him?”

“Of course I’m sure.” There are tears in her eyes, but she’s a stubborn woman, and bites her lip against letting them flow. “He is gone. He’s taken his precious things. Gorou says he’s gone to find somewhere he can be of use. My poor boy.” The words are too much for her, and a great sob shudders through her body.

“Don’t worry Mama.” The son at her side speaks up—Shun, you recall. “Yasu will come back. And if he doesn’t, we’ll be okay.”

Lan keeps crying, and you wonder what you’ll be able to do.

 **The Father**  
Nail comes to see you every day for the next two weeks. You’ve never particularly liked him; he’s one of the better colonists, as far as men who’ve come down to marry the village women go, but he’s still a colonist, and his rugged features are at odds with the people you count as family.

“Ban.” He says, spreading his arms to you, “Please tell me you have something.”

You never do, and you send him away with slumped shoulders and head bowed low. The twins are never far from his hand, skipping alongside him and asking cheerfully when they’ll see big brother Yas again, as though he hadn’t vanished without a trace. Nail smiles for them, a lighter man than he should be in the circumstances. You review your considerations and go to the family’s house.

 **The Telekinesist**  
Their home is a built-up shanty, carefully repaired and patched and boarded in more places than you can count; not for the first time, you wish the winters were less harsh at the base of the mountains. The colonists don’t like dead children on their borders and generously employ differently-skilled locals to travel among various remote towns when the weather turns bitter, doing their small part to maintain your country’s population. They value border towns like yours, and value your gratitude more.

Zhen is leaving as you knock upon the door, his face pinched and drawn grey. You dip your head to him and say nothing as he hurries past; you know he will say nothing in a place where Nail is likely to overhear. Shun answers the door and bows his head deeply to you, far too serious for a boy of six. The second-youngest, Akari, toddles into the entrance after him, clutching to his waist with grubby fingers. He lifts her to hold her on his side as he steps back to let you in, but the way her feet leave the floor before he touches her gives lie to how he manages the feat.

“Mama.” He calls, “Mr Ban from the police station has come.” There’s a sound of something crashing and a baby begins to wail. Shun adds, “He doesn’t have any news.”

“I need to speak to Gorou.” You say, loudly enough that poor Lan should be able to hear it through the walls. “If he was the last one to see Yasu.” You cast Shun a glance for confirmation, and the boy gives a nod.

“Let’s go find Gogo, okay Akari?” He whispers it softly to the sister on his waist, who waves a hand excitedly and chants, “Gogo, Gogo!”

As the children tramp off down the hallway, you can’t keep your thoughts from the man walking home in the dark, his shoulders hunched deeper than a rabbit’s den. Among the well-known secrets of your town, the fact that Zhen has fathered half of Lan’s children is the most well-spread.

 **The Father**  
Zhen has always looked older than he should, with cracked knuckles and knees looking too big for his skinny legs. He looks like he could be Lan’s father, but he’s only ten years her elder—only, as though they didn’t conceive their first child when Lan was fourteen and he was nearly twenty-five. There is love there, you know, and that’s part of why Nail permits Zhen access to their happy family. Lan has never told him directly, and neither has Zhen, but Nail is not a stupid man.

Gorou has the same wondrous power as his father, and Zhen’s long braid that curls and flicks like a cat’s tail was the subject of a great deal of discussion in the village inn.

Zhen hunches over the low table in his single room, sitting cross-legged on the floor, and smells his tea for a long time before he drinks it. It is his oldest son who is missing, and it is his oldest son who never managed to fit.

 **The Younger Brother**  
“Gogo!” Akari cries out excitedly, dropping from Shun’s arms and pitching across the floor to seize hold of Gorou’s hair. A modest braid, nurtured since his birth, twists delicately out of her hands and dangles just above her reach; Gorou turns to you with wide eyes and says, “I don’t know anything I didn’t tell Mama ‘n Papa.”

“That’s all right.” You smile reassuringly, sitting down on the floor to better match his height. The brothers are all older than they should be, perhaps because their mother needed as many hands as they had to keep hold of the twins. Even now, when they spend most of their time either on the ground or scaling trees, the evidence of Hibiki and Shiori can be seen as high up as the ceiling: brown foot and hand prints, moving in all directions. “Lan said Yasu told you he was going to be useful somewhere. Did he ever tell you why he felt like that?”

“Yas always wanted to do things.” Gorou’s a bit more receptive now, talking about his favourite brother. He twists his fingers in the ratted hem of his clothes, “He can’t do anything like me or Shun or Biki and Riri. Even though we don’t know what Akari can do, and Yuka’s brand new. He said he wasn’t good to us. He wanted to do something really good for someone.”

Gorou’s eyes are wet now, and you reach out to pat him gently on the shoulder. He sniffles as you speak. “Your big brother was really good to you, wasn’t he?” He nods firmly, and you wish you had better words to offer him. “I’ll do my best to bring him back to you.”

“What if he doesn’t want to come back?” Gorou sobs, and Akari plunks herself down on the floor to join him in wailing. Shun picks her up again and tries to rock her over his shoulder, but she beats her fists against him, kicking out in protest.

In the other room, you can hear Lan praying loudly, begging and hoping for her son to come home.

 **The Firstborn**  
He’s chosen a good week to flee, the tail end of a dry spell and a good few days before any rain is likely. He’s tied his hair up under his hat and spiralled away from everything he’s ever known, picking a treacherous goat path up the mountains.

“Don’t worry, Mama.” He says, clambering over the lip of a crack, “I’ll be okay. Papa will take care of you, and so will Mr Zhen. Akari has Shun to help her, and Biki and Riri have Gorou. You can take care of Yuka, and I can take care of me.”

He stands tall, before hunching down against a hissing wind. To his knees, he murmurs, “I’ll take care of me, and find someone I can be useful to. And I’ll come back someday you can all be proud of me. Okay?”

There is no one to answer him.

**Author's Note:**

> In his canon, Yasu is several years older than in this work, travelling with a young man named Sohma. Sohma is searching for what he needs, and Yasu is determined to help him for as long as it takes.


End file.
